The constitutive KO allele has been generated after Cre-mediated recombination by crossing chimeras to a Cre-Deleter on a C57BL/6 background.

The constitutive KO line has been derived using C57BL/6NTac animals and the Cre-transgene was removed by segregation.

Deletion of exon 3 should result in loss of function of the Slc39a8 gene by deleting the N-terminal part of the ZIP domain and the first 2 transmembrane domains, and by generating a frameshift from exon 3 to downstream exons (premature Stop codon in exon 4).

The remaining recombination sites are located in non-conserved regions of the genome.